FDA Cannot Regulate E-Cigarettes As Drug

It not so breaking news, the FDA has lost an appeal to regulate electronic cigarettes as drugs as they are now classified as a tobacco product. The ruling means the government can oversee the marketing of the products, not restrict their sale.

One of the bigger names in the case is electronic cigarette maker Sottera Inc., which does business as Njoy. They made their case that their products, battery-powered devices that generate a nicotine vapor instead of smoke, are tobacco products and not drugs. E-cigarettes are marketed as a tobacco alternative for “smoking pleasure,” rather than for therapeutic uses, the company said.

“We’re thrilled,” Craig Weiss, the president of Scottsdale, Arizona-based Njoy, said in a telephone interview. “Now we can continue to sell e-cigarettes under the regulations of the Tobacco Act.”

According to a Businessweek story that ran in early December:

“This ruling invites the creation of a wild west of products containing highly addictive nicotine, an alarming prospect for public health,” the group said in an e-mailed statement. “We urge the government to appeal this ruling to the U.S. Supreme Court.”

What do you think of this ruling? Is it fair? Are big tobacco companies scared of this new threat or was the FDA finally put in their place? Let us know in the comments below.